The winners of the 30th Hoso Bunka Foundation Award for outstanding programs have been selected.

The Grand Prize, given for the best documentary, went to the NHK program ‘The Man Who Fought Against SARS’.

An unknown infectious disease came to the notice of Dr. Carlo Urbani, an Italian doctor working at the Hanoi office of the World Health Organization. While hospital staff one by one fell victim to it, he continued to examine the patients and send reports to other doctors working with WHO. At the same time, he persuaded the Vietnamese Ministry of Health to make the situation public. As a result of his efforts, the WHO issued a global alert on the spread of the disease. By that time, however, Dr. Urbani himself had become infected. He died twenty-seven days after he had first examined a SARS patient. At the time of his death, Dr Urbani was 46 years old.

The story of this heroic struggle by a dedicated doctor who fought against SARS at the risk of his own life is one that produces a powerful impact on the viewer.

An English language version is available. (112 minutes)

For further information about this program, please make contact with Mr. Tatsuro Kubota of NHK (mail to : kubota.t-gy@nhk.or.jp).

The winner of Hoso-Bunka Foundation Prize is “WANDERINGS~ Exiled Koreans and Their Japanese Melody” produced by Kumamoto Broadcasting Company, one of the commercial broadcasters in Japan.

During the Meiji era, tracing back to more than one hundred years ago, a song called “Utsukushiki Tennen (Beautiful Nature)” was created in Japan. Up until today, the melody of this song has long been sung by Koreans who reside in Central Asia, as a native song called “Koguk Sanchon”.

These people are descended from Korean tribes, which left their home country and moved to Maritime Provinces of Siberia, trying to escape Japan’s colonialism of Korea. Then about 65 years ago, these people, as many as 400 thousand was forcibly moved from Siberia to the Central Asian districts such as Uzbekistan, by orders of Stalin. But today, influenced by the advent of nationalism, they are gradually moving to Rostov, a city in southern Russia.

In this documentary, viewers visit Koreans in different places, and follow the tracks of those who have kept singing the Japanese melody, with a strong belief that the song is a Korean folk song.

This program thoroughly examines histories and issues in a large scale, covering from Japan, Korea, Russia, Central Asia to Sakhalin, and was highly evaluated as a valuable record that unveiled the facts which had been unknown up to this day.

For further information about this program, please make contact with Mr. Masamichi Murakami of Kumamoto Broadcasting Company (mail to : murakami-m@rkk.co.jp).